Easterly winds, Tá sé gaofar inniu.

My classroom has two flagpoles just outside it, with our Active Schools Flag on one and our Green Schools Flag on the other. I think the flags are perfect for watching the wind and weather. Weather is one of my very dear  interests! The weather forecasts are about the only television programs I watch.
Most mornings in school, as I greet my children, we talk about the day, date and month, and the weather. We look out at the flags and we say whether it is windy, very windy or not windy at all. We usually do this in Irish (Gaelic/Gaeilge). The phrases we use are:
It is windy today =  Tá sé gaofar inniu. (Thaw shea gway-far inn-ue).
It is not windy today =  Níl sé gaofar inniu. (Neel shea gway-far inn-ue). 
It's a little bit windy = Tá sé beagáinín gaofar. (Thaw shea b'yug-awneen gway-far).
It is stormy = Tá sé stoirmiúil. (Thaw shea stirm-ool).

I love looking at those flags. Usually the wind is from the South-West, which would be our prevailing wind, bringing moist, relatively warm air from the Atlantic Ocean. Imagine my surprise today to see the flags then flying in an easterly wind! So much so that I remarked on it to the children.
What do you think the children will remember from my class and about me? Probably that I knitted a lot, that I could teach Maths and History all day if allowed and that I talked a lot about wind and weather and those flags!

At home, feeding of wild birds has resumed. Photos on the way, I found a cable for the phone to talk to the pc, Yippee!

 Yes, the cable works! So here, hiding behind a potted palm , is the Good Man himself, all dressed in red, he is on his way , I believe, in the next 2 weeks or so.

mild winter weather

We are having very mild winter weather at the moment. It is about 5 degrees warmer than is usual for this time of year, about 12 to 15 degrees centigrade in the day. I hung out 4 baskets of clothes yesterday and they were mostly dry in the afternoon. Quite amazing really.
(I have decided that the only way to have time to blog is to try to write short blog posts more frequently, rather than long rambling posts that take too long to write and edit. Bear with me!)
It is hard to believe that there are only 2 school weeks left till Christmas holidays. It really doesn't feel like Christmas is approaching, but then, maybe that's because I'm a grown-up now and not a child!

2:a Advent

It is the 2nd Sunday in Advent,  the 8th December.
We put our Christmas tree up, I was going to get no peace from my son until I did that!

Deireadh Fómhair, October

And so we are in October, the month known in Irish as 'End of Autumn' ie, Deireadh Fómhair.
Today we had a Referendum in our country, and I had an extra day off, as my place of work, like many primary schools, was being used as a polling station. My son was also off and we did a little bit of shopping in the morning as well as doing some errands that had to be done on a weekday, and then we went home, and son had his friend over for a few hours.
The rain stopped, the sun came out  and it was a glorious afternoon, only getting a bit chilly later as afternoon became evening.
Today I bought my daughter some safety essentials for her car, namely, a good wheel wrench and a high visibility vest. I plan to buy her a full emergency kit next weekend.
I have become very interested in learning more about the History of Spinning in Ireland, and am reading up on this topic wherever I find articles on it. I have my eye on a particular book on sale on eBay, we'll see if I 'win' it or not. More anon....
My wheels give me great joy. I am ever so grateful to have had the bit of money to buy them and to be able to keep them. Now my eyes light up when I see sheep locally. There are about 6 sheep in a field only a mile away. I am thinking of leaving a note in the letterbox of the adjoining house to ask about their fleece, when they get shorn. And I discovered another sheep grazing a lawn of a house 2 miles in the other direction. Needless to say there will not be enough space to store the fleece, nor time to spin it all up. I have plenty to be getting on with as it is.
I am thinking too of selling off my knitting books, and just keeping my spinning ones. After all, there are knitting patterns available for free on Ravelry and Knitty and Drops sites. But information on spinning is not as easy to find.
I got a pair of free tickets to go see Judy Collins (74 yrs young!!!!!) in Dromoland Castle last Sunday night. Darling Husband has been playing me her songs for years and so when I saw the ad in the local free newspaper for free tickets to her concert, I simply had to send off my email and hope for the best. I got the tickets and off we went. The concert was small and intimate. She was great, full of energy, and that amazing distinctive voice. The concert was being filmed possibly for televison in USA. It was just a great treat to get to see Judy Collins! Hubby was happy too.
Tomorrow, a trip to south County Cork awaits, for a christening of a new niece, and on Sunday we will celebrate my mother's 70th with a meal out.
I need to find the cable that connects my phone to the computer, my other camera got broken recently and I cannot put up photos without the little grey Nokia cable to connect phone to laptop....
Life continues, work, school, homework, some housework, meeting up with family and friends, watching the seasons change, children growing......
All is well here, thankfully.
Apologies for those would like some photos, I am aware that my blog needs more visuals, and less text maybe.....
I hope to remedy that soon enough.
Enjoy this Autumn weekend (Spring if you're in Australia!)
regards
liz

another week done, Autumn on the way

And so another week is down. That makes it two weeks back at school.
This is the week that my eldest daughter with my help bought herself her own first little car. She passed her driving test the previous week.
She will now drive herself to school and home again, and to her part-time job  and home again and I might actually have less driving to do as a result.
Two weeks done at school and plenty to be getting on with, copybooks (exercise books) to be corrected, and children to be reminded of the importance of Full Stops and Capital Letters!
The weather was gorgeous yesterday, it was sunny and warm, however today the weather turned, we woke up to rain (as forecast) and wind. The rain actually died down after a few hours and my Darling Husband hung out some clothes and they dried in the breeze. I was at that point having a nap as I was tired from demonstrating Spinning on my spinning wheel and spindle at the Hunt Museum in Limerick yesterday from 10am to 4pm, I do love to demo and to meet people and answer questions but i didn't realise how tired I already was from the week of work.
All fine now at least.
The swallows were gathered yesterday morning on the telephone wires when I was packing my wheel into the car, before 9am. There is no sign of the swallows today, I wonder if they flew away yesterday? It wouldn;t surprise me, there is a definite change in the air.
What does this week hold? well, some training sessions for my kids, soccer football , camogie etc, plenty school work and house work, not too many sressful things to do, i think, and hopefully I will get some time to take a walk, go for a swim, do yoga and sit and spin too...
Hope you all have a good week!

holidays over, new school year.

So another Summer is over, and another new school year has started.  I hope you have all had a good summer.
I went back to school about a week ago, on the 2nd of September.
It was a bit of a scramble in the end, getting everything and everyone ready for the return to school; no matter how many lists you have and how much stuff you buy, there is always some little item or two that Simply has to be bought Now, the day before school starts. But not to worry, in the end we all went back, I even managed to tidy my classrom and in particular the clutter corner in there, before we went back.
Now we are back our first full week, and all I can think about is Bed!  Getting enough sleep is going to be very important for all of us this academic year.
The weather, which had been very good overall, has now changed to Autumnal to say the least. I for one love the feeling of the chill in the still clear air in the mornings, the chill again in the evenings when the sun begins to go down, and the wonderful sunsets...
I will go now as it is sooooo late, I hope to get back in here again more frequently and write a few lines more often, let's see how I get on with that!
Take care all out there!
l

chillin time.....

so yes I am still on my hols, and enjoying it very much.

Quick summary so far:
June 28th: last day at school.

July 2nd/3rd: Heatwave started in Ireland!

July 5th, 6th, 7th: Feile Camogie competition in County Limerick, my 13 yr old played a few camogie matches in sweltering heat!

July 8th, final day of packing the suitcases, temps of up to 30degrees C all day, couldn't sleep much that night, humid and warm night,

July 9th: alarm clock rang at 4am, all up and out, on the road to Dublin Airport, heading for our flight to Sweden. Flew via Copenhagen, landed Göteborg, about 6pm. Finished off the day with a stroll down Andra Långgatan and a pizza from Pizza Rimini on Plantagegatan.

July 10th to July 22nd: Göteborg, and Karlstad. Bada  utomhus Örsholmens Tjärn (6 ggr minst), bada, bada, bada i Sundstabadet, bada, calzone, bada Getingberget, såg Stamfrändsmonumentet utanför Sunne igen (första gång var i oktober 1990 med Mikael och hans far H), var en heldag på Sunne Vattenland, åt gott hos Ölmes Prästgård ( Farmor fyllde 90), Siobhan såg en snok i vattnet, Sean trillade i, åkte på grusväg hem till Karlstad, cykla, virka, spinna med ny turkisk slända, såg elefanter säl och sjölejon (circus in town), drack Earl Grey te, Jag Körde Hem från Sunne! kusiner V och M, farbror J, Farmor I, BBQ med massor av Mikaels kompisar, cykla, bada, hitta nya lekplatser, åt gott, bada..... (basically translates as lots of swimming in lakes, eating Calzone and other pizzas, a snake in the water, elephants in the park, cycling, crochet, spinning on my new Turkish spindle and a bit of driving, on the wrong side of the road!)

July 23rd: alarm clock 4 am, på Landvetter Airport hotell this time, breakfast buffet (best ever!!) at 4,30 am, then flew out at 7am to Copenhagen, then Dublin, and drove home to Limerick and our own little house.
sigh......

July 24th: Daughter's birthday, but wet damp dull day, and all that unpacking and sorting to do...

July 25th: party for dear daughter, sun shone and lots of cousins and friends came, all had a smashing day!

July 27th: drove to Kilkenny Nowlan Park for a concert: BRUCE SPRINGSTEEN! Woo Hoo!!!! Brilliant night, over 3 hrs of non-stop music! Smashing! drove home, got home 1.45am.

July 28th: spent almost 2 hours happily spinning and meeting people in Zest cafe in limerick city, at the Limerick Knitting and Spinning and Craft group

July 29th, beginning to get down to the nitty gritty of doing the stuff that has to be done before school...

Hope the summer is treating you all well wherever you are,
hope it's not too hot, or too wet,
Me, I like it changeable, I do not like searing heat. Love watching the clouds roll in and then roll away after the showers.
Ha det så bra under sommaren!
Have a good summer